Westbourne Club

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Coaching Corner

The 4-2-4 formation

This formation is very rarely used in the professional game unless it is adopted in the final few minutes of a game when searching for a goal. However, at grassroots level this can be a very effective formation to use as the defenders you will be playing against will find it hard to cope with the four up front.

The very nature of this set-up suggests a direct approach. With four front players, the focus is to get the ball up to them as quickly as possible to put pressure on the opposition’s back four. The idea of this very attacking formation is to force mistakes from the defenders and to pressurise the goal as much as possible.

In the professional game it is rarely used as it leads to being overrun in midfield and good defenders can cope in one-v-one situations. At grassroots level it can prove to be a very effective way of playing as the defenders are not as adept at dealing with one-v-one situations and they tend not to take advantage of the weakened midfield.